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Ballad enthusiast Pia Toscano has been on a whirlwind press tour ever since being unceremoniously tossed off "American Idol" last week. (Oh, stop feigning shock, America. You didn't vote for her, dammit!) You can catch her on the "Today" show, "Live! With Regis & Kelly" and even MTV.com dodging questions about signing to major labels and dismissing rumored boy toy (and "Dancing With the Stars" pro) Mark Ballas as "just a friend."

But only MTV News asks the real questions — the questions that matter, the questions that keep our nation up at night, the questions that demand decisions that make Sophie's choice look like "paper or plastic."

So take a break from the hundreds of Pia "we'll see what happens with Interscope" interviews beaming out there on your TV sets and your computer screens and sink your teeth into MTV News' definitive Pia Toscano sit-down. Without further ado, we bring you: "10 Questions With Pia Toscano." You'll never think of "Deep Impact" the same way again.

All kidding aside, with Pia's powerhouse voice out of the competition, how will the top eight's Songs From the Cinema show play out? Who will step up and knock his or her vocals out of the park?

For a playful in-depth discussion of all things "Idol," you simply cannot miss my weekly show, "Idol Party Live," on Thursday at noon ET, only on MTVNews.com. This week's guests include season-six star Melinda Doolittle, "Idol" super-blogger MJ Santilli (from MJsBigBlog.com) and, of course, you! Tweet your thoughts on Wednesday night's performance show using the hashtag #idolparty, and you may be a co-star in Thursday afternoon's live broadcast!

What do you think is next for Pia? Let us know in the comments!

Tags American Idol, Pia Toscano

By James Dinh

After releasing the country version of her hit "Born This Way" last month, it appears as if Lady Gaga's now gone Bollywood. She's teamed up with famous Indian producers Salim and Sulaiman for a Desi-fied remix of "BTW," which debuted earlier this week. After listening to the re-worked tune, we couldn’t help but create a playlist of other noteworthy Bollywood-influenced tracks/remixes.

» Pussycat Dolls – "Jai Ho! (You Are My Destiny):" Originally used in the critically-acclaimed film "Slumdog Millionaire," Nicole Scherzinger (and, to a lesser extent, her Pussycat Dolls) teamed with producer Ron Fair on a revamped version of the song. In an interview with MTV News, Scherzinger admitted she original didn’t want to cover the Oscar-winning song saying," I was really scared and I kind of didn't want to do it. I heard the song and fell in love with it ... and I was scared to death to touch it. I was afraid for people to hear it before I even wrote it."

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Tags Bollywood, Born This Way, Lady Gaga

By Adam Stewart

I mean really, who can honestly say that dance music hasn't become a global phenomenon? After 10 days of polling, and over 34,000 votes tallied from 108 countries, the masses have spoken in our quest to find the biggest track to come out of Miami Music Week 2011. Our Dutch friend Tiësto, and collaborator Mark Knight came in with a landslide win in the final days with their #1 Beatport smash, "Beautiful World," featuring Dino.

When the poll first launched, Skrillex's remix of Benny Benassi's "Cinema" was neck and neck with Calvin Harris' Miami Monster "Awooga," and Dirty South's remix of Diddy Dirty Money's "Coming Home" stayed in the hunt in third place. But in the waning days of our poll, Tiësto and Mark Knight fans came through with a late effort placing the collaboration on top, scoring nearly 15,000 votes.

Not to be ignored was Sander Van Doorn's "Koko," which did not make our initial list of nominations, but was undoubtedly a fan favorite, and the topic of many reader comments. For this, we bestow a well-deserved Honorable Mention to SVD and his rabid following.

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Tags Mark Knight, MMW, Tiesto, Ultra Music Festival, video

SEATTLE — I had four hours. That should be enough to take in the past 20 years of Seattle music history, right?

Didn't matter. Four hours was what I had and I needed to make quick work of my 24-hour visit to the birthplace of Jimi Hendrix, grunge and the indie-rock revolution of the late '80s and early '90s.

My first stop was the Experience Music Project, the eye-catching sculptural paean to the Emerald City's music heritage funded by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and designed by that master of curved metal forms and cloud-like structures, architect Frank Gehry. I was ostensibly in town to get a sneak preview of "Nirvana: Taking Punk to the Masses," an exhibit tracing the influences and impact of the band that helped put Seattle on the map. But just five days before the doors were set to open, things were still far from ready-for-prime-time.

(Check out photos of Kurt Cobain's art, smashed guitars and Nirvana flyers.)

Workers shuttled around with tool-laden carts in the dark, reverent curved space, placing signs alongside such curios as the "Smells Like Teen Spirit" sweater the late Kurt Cobain wore in the video that ignited a revolution and putting together the wooden display cases (made from salvaged wood that Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic works with in his Washington-state hometown) that would house one of Novoselic's prized black Gibson Ripper bass guitars and the iconic Mosrite Gospel guitar that Cobain strummed at Seattle's OK Hotel show on April 17, 1991, where he played "Teen Spirit" in public for the first time.

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Tags iron-&-wine, Nevermind, Nirvana, seattle, sub pop, The Shins

By Zachary Swickey
For months, My Morning Jacket have been holed away in a church gymnasium outside their Louisville, Kentucky, hometown, recording their sixth Southern-fried opus, Circuital. Abandoning the more polished sounds of the last few records, the band have stated that the album takes them "back to their roots," with the songs reflecting the laid-back tone of At Dawn and It Still Moves. And, to date, fans have basically had to take their word for it — after all, Circuital doesn't hit stores until May 31 — but on Tuesday,all of that changed, when MMJ gave us the first taste of their new work with a free download of the title track. Upon first glance, you'll probably notice the song clocks in at well over seven minutes, a likely sign that their "roots" claim reigns true given the legendary length of their live sets.

But do the similarities stop there? Well, No. Because based off a few listens of "Circuital," it's safe to say My Morning Jacket are getting back to basics in a big way. Beginning with a mesmerizing, gently-plucked acoustic and frontman Jim James’ high-pitched croon, the song takes a minute (and, since there are seven of them, it's okay) to shift into high gear, but when it does — courtesy of an epic strum of the electric guitar — it recalls the band's biggest moments (and, strangely enough, the Who's "Won't Get Fooled Again.") Add rolling keyboards quietly keening in the background and lyrical nods to the interconnectivity of the universe ("Circuits connect the end of the moon/And our heavenly bodies,") the song uplifts the listener and boldly reaches for a higher consciousness. Oh, and just in case you're hurting for some of that classic MMJ live crackle, "Circuital's" got that, too, courtesy of some righteous guitar soloing and an extended, jamming outro.

So, while it certainly looks backward, "Circuital" also pushes My Morning Jacket towards something new, too. A bit of the past, a bit of the future ... like the song says, it's all connected somehow.

Tags Downloads, my-morning-jacket, The Interconnectivity of the Universe

It is no secret that I am quite a fan of Dave Grohl, a man I once described as being "on a mission to spread the good word." He's part apostle, part figurehead, he fronts one of the most successful rock acts on the planet — and played drums in one of the most influential — and, yet, he's not above appearing on "Yo Gabba Gabba" or making videos like this (or, this, for that matter).

Of course, having said all that, it pains me to reveal that Dave Grohl and now I have a big problem: He totally ripped me off.

See, I awoke this morning to read an interview Grohl did with LA Weekly about the Foo Fighters' brand-new Wasting Light album (it's in stores today and rules pretty hard; you should go buy it). In said interview, Grohl reveals that the Foos are employing a rather unique bit of marketing in conjunction with the album: Namely, that every copy will come with a piece of the master tapes Light was recorded on.

"We recorded the record in my garage to analog tape, and probably wound up with 20-30 reels of tapes, masters reels with all the takes on them, reels with alternate takes," Grohl says. "At the end of the session I thought it would be an extraordinary move to destroy all the masters and give the pieces of the tapes to the fans."

After reading that quote, my morning was ruined. Why? Because that was totally my idea! See, last month, when I interviewed the Foos for the debut of their "Rope" video, Grohl mentioned that the band had destroyed the original master tapes and I, half joking, responded that they should include fragments of it with copies of the album. Grohl laughed that it was "a great idea," and then we moved on.

Only, apparently we didn't. And as I prepare my voluminous lawsuit against the band, I figured I'd roll out the video evidence to back up my claim. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, please allow me to present Exhibit A:

See, irrefutable proof that this was my idea. So Grohl, consider this my fair warning: I'm totally coming after you. Or maybe not. After all, maybe you had this idea all along. Also, you're a pretty rad guy, and hiring a lawyer is probably a lot tougher than I realize. So maybe you can just give me a drum lesson or a platinum plaque or something like that. I'm willing to settle. I'm a believer, after all.

Tags Dave Grohl, Foo-Fighters, potential lawsuits, video

There's no doubt that Britney Spears is running the pop game right now with a #1 album, the confirmed addition of Nicki Minaj to her tour and of course, her steamy "S&M" remix with Rihanna.

So naturally, we're wondering who's next on Britney's collab list. Don't worry, we've got a few ideas.
First, let's talk fellow pop femme fatales. A Britney and Gaga collaboration would make the charts (and several of Twitter's servers) implode. And don't think we haven't noticed those friendly tweets back and forth between Brit and one of her original pop scene classmates, Christina Aguilera. Plus, who isn't hoping Beyoncé hops back on the scene a little sooner than planned?

Next, the male collab contenders. Maybe she'll follow Katy Perry's lead and snag studio time with Kanye West? Or continue along the line of working with younger artists (like her recent work with Selena Gomez) and make the Beliebers go crazy with a Justin Bieber duet?

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Tags britney spears, Poll, Rihanna

By Zachary Swickey
The White Stripes may have called it quits in February, but being an obsessive of the band is still a full-time job, thanks mainly to Jack White. His Third Man Records is seemingly working overtime to keep the band's legacy alive, with the release of a brand-new, career-spanning retrospective, which seems made for no one but obsessives.

The Stripes package features a live recording of the band's final performance, recorded on July 31, 2007 in Southaven, Mississippi, and available — of course — only as a double LP pressed on 180 gram vinyl. As the accompanying Third Man announcement boldly states, "This recording is (arguably) the band at the top of their game," and features a plethora of appropriately Delta covers (from the songbooks of Robert Johnson, Son House, Leadbelly).

But that's not all. The second component of the package is an exclusive 7", featuring a pair of the earliest White Stripes songs ever recorded — cover versions of Love's "Signed DC" and Otis Redding's "I've Been Loving You Too Long." Jack and Meg recorded the tunes just two months after their first live show and the recordings even pre-date their first official single.

And finally, there's a live DVD, dubbed "Under Moorhead Lights All Fargo Night," (a nod, of course, to their 2010 Canadian concert film), which was filmed way back in June 2000 at Ralph’s Corner Bar in Moorhead, Minnesota. The performance captures the band in their earlier days playing for just a handful of people, and features a cover of Iggy Pop's "I'm Bored."

The package is available only to members of the Third Man Vault, which, if you've read this far, you're probably a member of already.

Tags ephemera, Jack-White, white-stripes

This morning, Rihanna added another A-list collaboration to her lengthy résumé list. After RiRi and Britney Spears announced via Twitter this weekend that they did a remix of the Loud single, "S&M," the song hit the radio and Net. And, inevitably, we began recalling Rihanna's other partners in crime.

But, Brit is hardly the first superstar that RiRi has hooked up with. In fact, she has a pretty extensive list of features and collaborations. In the last 12 months, she's skyrocketed to the top of the charts with her Eminem collabo, "Love the Way You Lie," which appeared on the rapper's hit album Recovery. He returned the favor dropping a verse on her answer to the track on "Part 2" which appeared on Loud. Her one-time rumored beau, Drake, also made an appearance on the album, getting very, very sexy on the single "What's My Name?," which also hit #1 on Billboard.

She's worked with her mentor Jay-Z on multiple occasions: first on her smash hit "Umbrella," and then again on "Run This Town," which also featured Kanye West.

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Tags britney spears, Polls, Rihanna, S&M

By now, you're probably aware that Kelly Clarkson will return to "American Idol" this week, to perform her current Country smash "Don't You Wanna Stay" with Jason Aldean during Thursday night's results show.

Obviously, we're pumped by the news — after all, we loved Kelly's last album, 2009's All I Ever Wanted — and we're glad to see her stepping back into the spotlight to promote her still-too-far-away new album (she did a medley of her greatest hits last week on "The Ellen DeGeneres Show" last week). But, to be honest, it's not like this is the first time she'll be back on the show — shoot, she was on just last year, joining other "Idol" faves in a tribute performance to departing judge Simon Cowell — so we'd like to use this opportunity to shine a light on some of Clarkson's fellow "A.I." alumni ... because, really, they could use the love.

So, with Kelly booked, here are five other former "American Idol" contestants we'd like to see take the stage this year, for reasons as perverse as they are profound. After all, anybody's better than Iggy Pop, right?

» Antonella Barba: As those photos of her cavorting in the fountains of the National World War II Memorial proved, she is certainly the most, uh, patriotic contestant in "Idol" history (take that, Kristy Lee Cook!), and judging by her official site, her schedule's clear. Plus, with Glenn Beck vacating our airwaves, someone needs to fill the "marginally talented jingoist" slot, don't they?

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Tags American Idol, kelly-clarkson, Lists, Sanjaya, taylor-hicks